In a Wonderland They Lie

[vovat]

Recently, my friends page has featured some discussion of Tim Burton's upcoming Alice in Wonderland film. I think it has some potential, although it kind of seems like Alice has been filmed to death. I know that Paramount did a version in the thirties, featuring several stars of the era, including Cary Grant, W.C. Fields, and Gary Cooper. I've never seen this version, and Netflix doesn't appear to have it. Then there was Disney's 1951 animated version, which I liked pretty well, but thought kind of missed the point. (I've heard that it was one of Walt's least favorite full-length animated features.) I also remember the mid-eighties musical with Carol Channing and Jonathan Winters, and there have been plenty of others over the years. Burton does seem to be taking an interesting new take on the story, though, with its being sort of a sequel with an older Alice. As long as it's done well, I don't know that I can say I really object to that. After all, we're never really told about the future life of the books' Alice (as opposed to the real Alice Liddell, who married Reginald Hargreaves and became a society hostess). It's not like how people want to write scripts about a grown-up Dorothy Gale, when anyone who's read the Oz books knows that she came to live in Ozma's palace and DIDN'T grow up.



It looks like this new movie, like several other (perhaps even most) adaptations over the years combines elements from both Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass. I guess filmmakers tend to think Alice's adventures are crazy enough that the order of events doesn't really matter that much. I know some takes have combined both books into one long story. In truth, I find Looking-Glass to be significantly different from Wonderland, in that it has more order and sticks more closely to particular themes (chess, mirror reversals, and nursery rhymes [1] being the main ones), but I've never had any serious objections to, say, Tweedledum and Tweedledee showing up in the domain of the Queen of Hearts. In fact, Carroll actually intended for the Hatter and the March Hare to reappear in Looking-Glass, although I didn't realize this in my childhood until I finally read a version of the book with the original illustrations.



[1] The only featured nursery rhyme that I was actually familiar with as a kid was "Humpty Dumpty." I guess the other two have decreased in popularity over the years (and maybe "The Lion and the Unicorn" was never that big outside the United Kingdom).

Comments

[alicornmoon.livejournal.com]

I always liked the chess scene :3. Of course I think the darkest thing of the whole series (the one that stays with me the most) is the lady with the pig baby O.O

I grew up with the Loin and The Unicorn because my ma raised me on many stories from the UK *hugs Pooh and Now We Are Six*, but I never understood the symbolism :P

[kevenn.livejournal.com]

I can't wait for it. The 1980's TV musical mini-series was always, and still is, my favorite version of this tale. I think Tim Burton's movie is going to be really good because it's playing with themes, but not trying to be the original. I get the feeling that it'll be Alice In Wonderland's "Tin Man."

[vovat.livejournal.com]

You mean the Red Queen will have magical tattoos on her boobs? :P

[vovat.livejournal.com]

In The Annotated Alice, Martin Gardner suggested that the baby turning into a pig was a result of Carroll's general dislike of young boys.

I grew up on the Pooh books (a Pooh story was the first thing I read on my own), but not on "The Lion and the Unicorn."

[alicornmoon.livejournal.com]

Oooh...well it is still like, horror movie scarring to me for some reason, even more than things in the rest of Wonderland or the darker elements of OZ. I think it might be his mother's (nanny's?) reaction or just that whole family altogether. It was like no one even truly cared or had any love...

[vovat.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it doesn't seem at all fair that the BABY is the one who's punished for his abusive family. But I guess Wonderland was never about fairness.

[alicornmoon.livejournal.com]

The poor thing :(

[rockinlibrarian.livejournal.com]

I agree, this scene always freaked me out too.

[jadavisofmo.blogspot.com (from livejournal.com)]

I too look forward to the story Tim Burton will tell.

My personal favorite adaptation of Alice is the 1972 one with Fiona Fullerton as Alice and Michael Crawford as the White Rabbit. (Too bad there isn't a perfect DVD of it out there. The US releases look like crap, and the DVD from the UK has a clear, widescreen transfer, but still imperfect.) It kept mostly to the first book. The Tweedles come in after the caterpillar, and that's all the "Through The Looking-Glass" that's in it. There also seems to be a deleted scene of the Cheshire Cat and Alice's scene, so that's not there. The Cheshire Cat is still in the Duchess' House and at the Croquet Game.

Sam Milazzo and I did talk once about how we would do Alice if we got the chance. We both said "Do a two-movie deal." I also mentioned pulling some ideas from the original "Alice's Adventures Underground": start with Dodgson and the Liddell sisters boating while someone reads "In The Golden Afternoon," and then pan over to the river bank, where we see the Alice of the story and her sister.

BTW, "The House At Pooh Corner" was the first full-length book I read on my own. The next was this odd book about some girl who gets carried away by a cyclone.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

You mean Tammy Thompson and the Terrible Tornado? {g}